Significance Objective The objective of this preliminary study is to develop a primate model to study human respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection. The model will be used to study pathogenesis of the disease and to test new vaccine strategies. To develop this model we used a mouse-adapted human RSV isolate and infected an infant rhesus monkey by aerosol. The monkey was monitored daily for development of clinical signs and virus shedding was evaluated daily by culturing swabs taken from the nasal cavity. Results The monkey failed to become infected. Currently we are developing an assay (ELISA) to measure RSV-specific antibody titers in monkeys, so that we can test a large number of monkeys at the Primate Center to see if the population has been exposed to RSV from human contact, and therefore might have some resistance. Future Directions In a future experiment we will use a recent human RSV isolate to expose a monkey and will re-isolate the virus for use in future experiments if the infection attempt is successful. Future plans include development of a primate model of allergic asthma, which will be used along with the RSV-infection model to study the interrelationship between RSV infection and allergic asthma. KEYWORDS respiratory syncytial virus, allergy, asthma, ELISA